perl582delta(1)


NAME

   perl582delta - what is new for perl v5.8.2

DESCRIPTION

   This document describes differences between the 5.8.1 release and the
   5.8.2 release.

   If you are upgrading from an earlier release such as 5.6.1, first read
   the perl58delta, which describes differences between 5.6.0 and 5.8.0,
   and the perl581delta, which describes differences between 5.8.0 and
   5.8.1.

Incompatible Changes

   For threaded builds for modules calling certain re-entrant system
   calls, binary compatibility was accidentally lost between 5.8.0 and
   5.8.1.  Binary compatibility with 5.8.0 has been restored in 5.8.2,
   which necessitates breaking compatibility with 5.8.1. We see this as
   the lesser of two evils.

   This will only affect people who have a threaded perl 5.8.1, and
   compiled modules which use these calls, and now attempt to run the
   compiled modules with 5.8.2. The fix is to re-compile and re-install
   the modules using 5.8.2.

Core Enhancements

   Hash Randomisation
   The hash randomisation introduced with 5.8.1 has been amended. It
   transpired that although the implementation introduced in 5.8.1 was
   source compatible with 5.8.0, it was not binary compatible in certain
   cases. 5.8.2 contains an improved implementation which is both source
   and binary compatible with both 5.8.0 and 5.8.1, and remains robust
   against the form of attack which prompted the change for 5.8.1.

   We are grateful to the Debian project for their input in this area.
   See "Algorithmic Complexity Attacks" in perlsec for the original
   rationale behind this change.

   Threading
   Several memory leaks associated with variables shared between threads
   have been fixed.

Modules and Pragmata

   Updated Modules And Pragmata
   The following modules and pragmata have been updated since Perl 5.8.1:

   Devel::PPPort
   Digest::MD5
   I18N::LangTags
   libnet
   MIME::Base64
   Pod::Perldoc
   strict
       Documentation improved

   Tie::Hash
       Documentation improved

   Time::HiRes
   Unicode::Collate
   Unicode::Normalize
   UNIVERSAL
       Documentation improved

Selected Bug Fixes

   Some syntax errors involving unrecognized filetest operators are now
   handled correctly by the parser.

Changed Internals

   Interpreter initialization is more complete when -DMULTIPLICITY is off.
   This should resolve problems with initializing and destroying the Perl
   interpreter more than once in a single process.

Platform Specific Problems

   Dynamic linker flags have been tweaked for Solaris and OS X, which
   should solve problems seen while building some XS modules.

   Bugs in OS/2 sockets and tmpfile have been fixed.

   In OS X "setreuid" and friends are troublesome - perl will now work
   around their problems as best possible.

Future Directions

   Starting with 5.8.3 we intend to make more frequent maintenance
   releases, with a smaller number of changes in each. The intent is to
   propagate bug fixes out to stable releases more rapidly and make
   upgrading stable releases less of an upheaval. This should give end
   users more flexibility in their choice of upgrade timing, and allow
   them easier assessment of the impact of upgrades. The current plan is
   for code freezes as follows

   *   5.8.3 23:59:59 GMT, Wednesday December 31st 2003

   *   5.8.4 23:59:59 GMT, Wednesday March 31st 2004

   *   5.8.5 23:59:59 GMT, Wednesday June 30th 2004

   with the release following soon after, when testing is complete.

   See "Future Directions" in perl581delta for more soothsaying.

Reporting Bugs

   If you find what you think is a bug, you might check the articles
   recently posted to the comp.lang.perl.misc newsgroup and the perl bug
   database at http://bugs.perl.org/.  There may also be information at
   http://www.perl.com/, the Perl Home Page.

   If you believe you have an unreported bug, please run the perlbug
   program included with your release.  Be sure to trim your bug down to a
   tiny but sufficient test case.  Your bug report, along with the output
   of "perl -V", will be sent off to perlbug@perl.org to be analysed by
   the Perl porting team.  You can browse and search the Perl 5 bugs at
   http://bugs.perl.org/

SEE ALSO

   The Changes file for exhaustive details on what changed.

   The INSTALL file for how to build Perl.

   The README file for general stuff.

   The Artistic and Copying files for copyright information.





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